Poison Penmanship: The Gentle Art of Muckraking (6 page)

In the absence of more impressive copy from police sources, at least two newsmen turned detective and sought to dig up evidence themselves.

Ed Montgomery of the
Examiner
found a bit of Venetian blind cord with hair adhering to it in the flower bed near where Messinger parked his car. The color of the hair was “similar to that of the girl”, and Montgomery, in true amateur sleuth fashion, was reported to have “carefully avoided touching it until police arrived”. (
Examiner
, 7/27/57)

Once again, the dissonant theme—that pointing to innocence—was almost drowned out. But it was there, for the observant reader, at the end of the story: “... the cord was considered to be of secondary importance, since the landlord at Messinger’s rooming house is in the Venetian blind business”. Thus vanished the spine-chilling significance of the blind cord!

From time to time the dissonant theme would crop up in unobtrusively placed paragraphs:

“The D.A.’s office indicated the possibility that the inquiry might be running into a wall by saying ‘we are not prepared to take the case to the Grand Jury at this time’ ” (
Examiner
, 7/31/57) or, “Inspectors still had no physical evidence to link Messinger with the attack and preliminary reports from the Oakland crime laboratory showed ‘only possibilities, nothing obvious’ ”. (
Chronicle
, 7/29/57)

Only once did an authoritative voice, bluntly expressing dissatisfaction with the turn of events, take precedence in headlines and news space over the “chase” aspects of the case. Public Defender Abraham Dresow was prominently featured in all newspapers (8/1/57) as saying, after an interview with Messinger, “The police are holding the wrong guy”.

However, a new development swiftly banished Dresow’s statement from the front pages.

The second of the
Examiner
sleuths, Larry Cahn, had been working on a store-by-store check of the city looking for the person who sold Messinger the manacles used to chain the victim’s legs.

On August 3rd, the
Examiner
reported success: “Mrs. Jenelle St. James, former surplus store clerk, positively identified Allan Messinger as the man to whom she sold a set of manacles about 2 months ago”.

She was quoted as saying, “I am sure that is the man ... I am certain of it ...”

This was, by any standards, new evidence of real importance in the case against Messinger. A second positive eyewitness identification linking him with the crime had now been added to that of the victim. Chief of Inspectors Daniel McKlem was prominently quoted in all papers as being “firmly convinced he is the man”.

Just a week earlier, Mrs. St. James had told the Examiner she had seen Messinger in the store but “was unable to recall whether he had bought the manacles”. What could have happened in the intervening time to refresh her recollection?

The disturbing question was never answered. For within hours on that busy Saturday an
Examiner
extra had hit the streets with the headline,

“NEW SUSPECT ADMITS TORTURE; MESSINGER ELIMINATED”.

By afternoon the whole story was out.

Three days earlier, two narcotics agents following up a routine tip, had picked up a tiny, 5-foot drug addict, Melvin Bakkerud, former inmate of an insane asylum. The arrest had not even merited one line in any newspaper. Bakkerud was held for investigation of peddling dope in San Francisco’s South of Market area.

A search of his room turned up, among other things, a gold wristwatch with distinctive markings. A police inspector “remembered reading in the Chronicle” Lonergan’s description of his stolen watch. He checked the description with the watch found in Bakkerud’s room. It tallied. Confronted with the watch, Bakkerud readily confessed to the assault in Golden Gate Park. He led police to the hidden “torture kit”, containing tape, cord, scissors, knife. The police criminologist found within ten minutes microscopic evidence that fibres taken from Bakkerud’s belongings matched those from the victims’ clothing.

And the manacles? Bakkerud had stolen them from the glove compartment of a San Francisco police car on the night of the crime. Apparently the theft had never been noticed or reported, much less linked with the assault.

A badly shaken press and police department set about picking up the pieces—and assigning the blame.

“San Francisco police had worked up a case strong enough to send an innocent man to San Quentin for life”, said the
Chronicle
(8/6/57)

“The cops were out for a conviction more than they were out for the truth. They think a case is solved when they get a suspect”, said Public Defender Dresow. (
Examiner
, 8/4/57)

“I never said positively that I was sure he was the one,” said the victim (
Examiner
, 8/4/57)

“(Chief of Inspectors) McKlem denied having been ‘certain’ Messinger was the man,” reported the
Examiner
(8/4/57)

“The description furnished by the victim was way off”, said the
Chronicle
(8/6/57), pointing out that in every essential the published description, that of Messinger and that of Bakkerud were totally at variance.

“Above all, Messinger lied”, editorialized the
News
(8/6/57). “Had it not been for his falsehoods, police would never have been able to build up a case against him”.

There was little comment by the newspapers on their own part in the case. The
News
(8/6/57) was the only one to tackle this aspect of the post mortem. It editorially extolled the “spotlight of public interest which said in effect, ‘you must be certain; you must prove your case’ ... Our kind of society demands facts. Spurred on by public interest, the police produced the facts—and cleared him”.

In a subsequent television program,
News
editor Albert Colgrove explained newspaper use of the word “FANG”. He pointed out that it made for easier headline treatment than SUSPECT because it contains fewer letters.

Questioned about the relationship between crime news and circulation, he answered that there is indeed a most important relationship. He cited the fact that the day of Abbott’s execution had been the second biggest circulation day of San Francisco’s history, exceeded only by the day of the recent earthquake.

He pointed out that, in the absence of crime news, there would be many fewer newspaper readers, and thus many would be denied the opportunity to read about such worthy activities as those of the United Crusade.

A New Zealand judge had taken a different view of the matter. Commenting on pre-trial discussion of sensational cases by the press, Mr. Justice Blair said: “It is idle for such newspapers to claim they adopt such practices in the public interest. Their motive is the sordid one of increasing their profits, unmindful of the result to the unfortunate wretch who may ultimately have to stand trial ...”

The Messinger case disappeared speedily from the pages of the city’s newspapers, but it had thrown into sharp relief some disquieting questions.

How reliable is eyewitness identification? The girl’s positive accusation, to which was added that of the manacles saleslady, was the heart of the case against Messinger. Yet the young victim, it turned out, had not the slightest idea of what her attacker looked like.

Should police be permitted, prior to indictment and trial, to feed the press step-by-step details of their work?

Should the scramble for headlines, in turn, be permitted to build up such pressure on police to “produce” that careful, dispassionate, scientific investigation of the facts becomes a near impossibility?

Should U.S. courts be given power of contempt over the press such as exists in England where all pre-trial comment on evidence is forbidden? English law is very clear and extremely severe on this subject. “To speak of an accused person as a rogue ... is wrongful, and is certain to be followed by a fine ...” (Harvard Law Review, Vol. 48). Presumably, the same penalty could be expected to apply in England with even greater force to one who spoke of an accused person as a “fang fiend”.

Americans, traditionally zealous in defense of freedom of the press, may be reluctant to accept such drastic curbs.

But there is a growing awareness of the menace of trial by headline.

What happened to Messinger could have happened anywhere in the U.S.

Indeed, two cases—those of Abbott and Dr. Sam Sheppard in Cleveland, Ohio—already had stirred consideration of the problem in the ranks of the legal profession.

Joseph A. Ball, President of the California Bar, writing in the State Bar Journal (May-June, 1957) comments:

“The controversy between free press and fair trial continues ... It is an undeniable fact that freedom of the press or the freedom of lawyers to discuss pending trials in newspapers has resulted in trial on the front page rather than in the courtroom.

“The disgraceful episode in Cleveland during the trial of Dr. Sheppard received the criticism of bench, bar and the conservative press.

“Said the Toledo
Blade:

‘The press never left any doubt of the verdict it expected, which was not surprising in view of its having plunged so deep into the processes of administering justice by its own rules.’

“Then followed the Burton Abbott case in Oakland, California, where the news stories outdid the prosecution in prejudging the result ...”

He proposes “a code of civilized restraints which would insure a fair trial for all accused of crime” as an objective of both lawyers and press.

He states in conclusion, “No freedom is more important than that of personal freedom, and no right more sacred than that of due process of law. Unfair trial is a social evil. Practices which threaten the fairness of a trial must be curbed ...”

The story of the Messinger case illuminates the urgent need for the press to take strong action to police itself.

Short of some pretty drastic measures on the part of news editors to end the evil of trial by headline, it seems not unlikely that courts and public may demand legal sanctions like those used in England to end the prejudging of cases in the newspapers.

end

COMMENT

To put this in context: in 1957, when this article was taken by the
Nation
, I was plugging away at my autobiography,
Daughters and Rebels
, various drafts of which had already been turned down by at least a dozen distinguished American publishers. This freezing reception discouraged me, so I put the book aside; it was anyway a bit late, I thought, at the ripe age of forty to embark on a writing career. However the Messinger story, for several days an ongoing newspaper drama, caught my eye and I thought I would try my hand at writing an article about it.

At the time this now musty old piece was published, I was inordinately proud of it: my first article ever to be accepted by a national magazine. I loved writing it and I adored seeing it in print. As my firstborn, I still feel some maternal affection for it; but rereading it, I detect all sorts of lapses of style and content. For that reason I reproduce here the original typescript, just as it was submitted, so that the reader can pick it to pieces as an exercise in editing.

Why those oddly short paragraphs, having nothing to do with change of subject, which I have since learned is the whole point of paragraphs? Because at the time my chief mentor and volunteer editor was a newspaper reporter, the only professional writer I knew; he loathed long paragraphs as anathema to daily news writing, and was forever cutting mine into minuscule (and, as I now see, illogical) bits. Also, I regret those exclamation marks, which strike me as a form of unnecessary emphasis.

Why did I not seek to interview the principals in the story—police, prosecutor, Messinger, the victim, and above all those culpable newspaper editors whose comments would doubtless have made excellent copy? I suppose I assumed they would rebuff me and refuse to answer questions. I now know better. It is the rare and exceptional individual, in almost any line of work, who will decline the opportunity to expound his views to a reporter.

Despite these shortcomings, the story itself was, I think, of intrinsic interest at the time; in any event, the
Nation
liked it enough to accept it from an unknown writer.

The
Nation
’s editors fixed it up considerably, beginning with the first sentence; they struck out that silly phrase “if slightly un-grammatical” (after all, who but some hoary grammarian would exclaim “That is he!” when identifying the person who assaulted her?), they brought order and logic into the paragraphing, they improved many a laboriously constructed sentence, they deleted all those boring dates of newspapers which I had put in as evidence of my meticulous research, and corrected the misspelling of “non-sequitur.”

But also, to my annoyance, they left out the whole conclusion, presumably because they did not agree with my point about the need for judicial restraints on the press. As the main purpose of the exposé type of article is to generate corrective action—in this case, to alert courts, legislatures, and the general public to the evil of trial by headline—excision of these proposals robbed the piece of much of its intended thrust. Thereafter I have tried (not always successfully, as we shall see in the comments on some of the other pieces in this collection) to extract an agreement ahead of time from magazine editors that
no
changes will be made without consultation.

Looking back, I realize that publication of this slim effort was for me a turning point. It gave me encouragement to continue struggling with my book despite rebuffs—it made me, for the first time, begin to think of myself as a “writer.”

*
Not his real name. I’ve changed it to a fictitious name in order to protect his privacy.

ST. PETER, DON’T YOU CALL ME

FRONTIER /
November, 1958

The American Way of Death, though not extolled in song, story, and news articles to the same extent as its more popular counterpart, the American Way of Life, has nevertheless come in for a fair share of attention in recent years. Sometimes it is the subject of an uneasy kind of humor. Thus, San Francisco
Chronicle
columnist Herb Caen suggests a slogan for mortuaries who desire to compete with the auto industry’s recent anti-recession campaign: “You Auto Die Now.”
The New Yorker
ran a cartoon of a mortuary decorated with signs announcing, “We Give Green Stamps.” Evelyn Waugh based his best-selling novel
The Loved One
on the romance between the head cosmetician of an ornate Los Angeles mortuary and an employee of a pet cemetery.